The "2 + 2 is only cultural" spoof came from James Lindsay [View all]

[janterry]

of the Sokal Squared fame!

James A. Lindsay, Peter Boghossian, and Helen Pluckrose came to prominence attacking 'Grievance Studies,' poor 'scholarship, and post-modernism. They published academic articles that were pure nonsense, but because they cloaked them in post-modern 'theory' they were published. (If you don't know who they are, it's an amusing story - well worth exploring)

Their interest is in taking on postmodernism. (They are all classic liberals, with liberal values).
They hate postmodernism.


In this case - Lindsay tweeted the nonsensical:

“2+2=4: A perspective in white, Western mathematics that marginalizes other possible values.”

And, like a charm, it worked! People picked it up and started to BELIEVE it.

One of those 'spoofed' came to the attention of someone here and a thread was posted about it:

https://www.democraticunderground.com/122870470

Lindsay explains his project here:
https://newdiscourses.com/2020/08/2-plus-2-never-equals-5/